Elder Christensen: Letter 2/24/14 "Awesome Week!"

Well Family, this week was Awesome! We found a new investigator and his 10 year old son. They are super prepared. We taught the restoration and they watched the DVD that night together. We where on exchanges that day, but I got to invite him to baptism on the 1st lesson, and he said yes! :) They will be coming to church this week. So excited!! We also came by on Saturday and helped him work on his Jeep. I got to use a torch wrench and mount the head on his engine and we just got to know each other really good.

We also moved Austin to his new house just down the street from West our other investigator. They are the same ages and they're good friends and they give him rides to church so both their baptism dates are on! Heck yes! I hope I can stay here for my final full transfer. This is an awesome area!! The young men this week are doing baptism's for the dead at the St. Louis temple. I got it approved and we are going to take West and Austin and give them a tour on the grounds of the temple and have a lesson with them as well. Should be a good week! :) 

It was so cool to have 6 investigators at Church this Sunday between us and the sisters. The ward was kinda shocked we had that many people to teach let alone bring to church. ha ha! So I ordered my new camera last week and I got it, but it was the wrong camera. It was the S6500 not the 6800, so I called the guy I bought it from and he was in Montana, so I knew he'd be a good guy! I told him what had happened and he said I could return it and he'd give me some free movies or games, but I was like I'm a missionary for my church, so I can't really use those things... Then I told him there was a 100 dollar difference between this camera and the one I orderes and he said well then how about I refund you $125 and we call it good, so I was like, "ok sweet. I just got a 100 dollar camera for 50 bucks!" Then he called me 5 minutes later and said sorry man, but we made another mistake we just refunded all your money- $170. But this is an easy way to train a new employee, so just keep the money and the camera. So Happy day here ha ha!!! So I'll be posting pictures soon but none with me in them. Ha! Ha! It's gonna be a surprise when I get home!! 

The Sandy Creek sisters got in an accident this week, so that wasn't good but it was with a former investigator of ours, so in a few weeks when this all pans out we will be contacting him again. Ha! Ha! I'm glad it wasn't the sister's fault though. Black dots aren't fun to have! Ha! Ha! I hope everyone had a good week!

Love Elder Christensen 

Elder Christensen: Letter 2/18/14 "Doe he know de are da lord's Chips?"

Well family, another week has gone by. We taught West the law of tithing and he was just blown away that we don't pay anyone in our church. He loved know that tithing money goes to buildings and temples. He said "every church should be like that." Won't argue that the Lord's money should go to the Lord and no pastor or priest should rob God! We also had tons of meetings this week and one of them was way south in Cape zone and I was very tired from the drive and I pulled out my GPS to find some food and I could not believe my eyes! I almost cried! There is a TACO JOHNS in Cape! It was so beautiful. Reminded me of all the trips I've taken with my family. :) They didnt have the apple crisp, but everything else there was dang good. Made me very happy! :) Austin and West both didn't make it to church this week which was a bummer. Both had family drama, but that's no excuse for missing church! Ha! Ha! 

We had Zone p-day this Monday, and we all went Roller Skating, and I couldn't believe how fun that was. I haven't skated like that in 6 years. Ha! Ha! It also reminded me of why 80's music still is the best. Ha! Ha! Love those tender mercies! In the words of President Clark, "if you cant avoid it, Enjoy it!" I miss that man!

On a good note thoough, we got a Less Active and his son to finally come to church. They haven't been in like 8 months and really missed it, which I found odd. Most Less Actives I've talked to try to convince themselves either they don't need church or that they hate it, or the people. Ha! Ha! But they really missed being in the loving atmosphere of the church. The most important thing was they missed having the Spirit and that's the part that doesn't surprise me. I love the feelings you get from the Holy Ghost! Nothing can replace that! I'm truly convinced that's what keeps our members coming back every Sunday. We wouldn't do half the things we do as a church if it wasn't for the Spirit being there with us through it all. There is no way I would've left my family for 2 years and put my life on hold, unless I knew the Holy Ghost would be by my side for those 2 years!  And I'm so thankful for all the lessons I've been able to learn in this time.:) I hope everyone is doing well! 

Love Elder Christensen 

Elder Christensen: Letter 2/10/14 "Service Surfing"

Well family, we had a much better ending to this week. We had West come to church with his father and they loved the service! We had ward conference and sister Perkins sang "I Need Thee Every Hour," and that was the most powerful musical I've ever heard!!! She couldn't even finish the 3rd verse because the Spirit was so strong. It was awesome and to have a investigator there and his inactive father made it that much better! West was like "is it this good every Sunday?" And I said, "well she sings every Sunday, just not a solo so try and sit close to her and it can be!" Ha! Ha! He went with the young men and they took him under their wing which was super cool to see. He is being loved by everyone around him and that's so powerful. Maybe we can get one of the young men to baptize him too! 

We also taught West the commandments and the Word of Wisdom, and I shared my personal testimony of the time when I was at a party where their wasn't the best of people and drugs and things. So I left, seeing the changes in the party and as I left, I saw a cop come around the corner and busted tons of kids from school and had I not listened to the Holy Ghost, then I would've been busted too. That really meant a lot to him. He was like, "that's the most amazing thing I've ever heard. Can I give you a high five right now?" I was like, "oh ya you can!" We also taught him the Law of Chastity and he is fully reading to live all of it, so we're moving forward. :) 

Austin's dad flaked on 2 of our appointments this week, so we didn't get to see him and he didn't come to church, so his baptism date may or may not happen. We will see? Hope he buckles down even though his dad is not much help and really wants this for himself! 

Kathy Cooper our newest member was super sick and had a bad medication reaction. She was in the ER earlier this week and we gave her a blessing and she made a full turn around in time for Sunday. She was so happy we came and helped her. She said "There is just a sense of peace when you guys are around." So that was great to hear! I'm proly just numb to the peace. Ha! Ha! But I'm glad we got to help and strengthen her testimony! 

Service was fun this week as well we help tons of old ladies at a food pantry and they got a gold bar rip stick and where like hmmm we gave give this to anyone and how does this thing even work ? So i showed then how it worked and they were all blown away lol They made me perform 3 times that day they where like man its like hes flying around the room lol kinda felt like it to cuz i had many obstacles to swing around ha ha It felt so good to ride that to doesn't help me with my many snowboarding dreams but its fun to ride in circles in the apartment at lunch time lol ! They gave me the rip stick for payment of my performing ha ha!!!  I love you all 

Love Elder Christensen   

 

Elder Christensen: Letter 2/3/14 "Trial and Air"

Earlier this week we had both Austin and West come to Young Mens, and they built an obstacle course / Par-core course and that was pretty fun to watch. They really bonded well with all the other young men and then after all they young guys ran the course they made me and my companion run the course as well. Of course as a missionaries you're obligated to get the best time. So I did! Ha! Ha! I had to represent the Missouri St. Louis mission right! My favorite part of the whole course was they had a full round table that you have to go over and most people would slide on it and I ran as fast as I could and jumped as high as I could and I cleared the whole table. That really helped my time and all the young men where like "what no way?" It was pretty funny! 

Well Family another week has gone by. I hope everyone enjoyed their Superbowl parties. We had a non-Superbowl party with the Tuckers. That was pretty fun! Kathy Cooper was baptized this past Saturday and that was a pretty eventful baptism! We didn't have a jumpsuit big enough, so we ran to all the other buildings to try and find a 3XL but had no luck, so we had our ward mission leader get his white pants and doubled up on white shirts lol. We had Brother Forrest, one of her now really good friends in the church, baptize her, and he was a pretty old fellow himself. So that was a sight to see as well. That was the slowest baptism I've ever witnessed! Ha! Ha! But it was super spiritual as well! It was really cool to see how determined she was to get baptized when all these obstacles got in her way. She was focused and said ok this will not be what keeps me from getting baptized and she was pushing through all these trials so that was cool to see! I could really relate to her with being close to the end of my mission.There have been many trials that have been hitting me in this final stretch of my mission. My camera broke on me and investigators have been not keeping their commitments and many other things, but this life would be pretty boring without trials so I say "bring it on!!!"  "Trials are simply opportunities." They can either help you grow or you can let them get you down! So I'm going to keep on pushin on till I've got no more push left in me! I Love you all and hope that you had a great week :) 

Love Elder Christensen 

Elder Christensen: Letter 1/27/14 "Stay'n Pray'n"

Well family, I'm staying one more transfer here in Crystal City. Maybe we will break my record of 2 transfers ha ha!! This week we had Kathy Cooper's Baptismal Interview. She passed:) We also contacted the Less Active and his son and taught the Restoration. We also extended a Baptismal invitation and he said yes so thats good news. Maybe we will have 2 baptisms in February and 1 in March. Not too bad for a dead area 6 weeks ago! We also had 3 Less actives come to church this week so that was a cool way to end this transfer. The sisters in our ward had 2 other investigators there as well so that was a very full Sunday! Then we had a priesthood meeting after all that and the focus was on Senior Couples serving missions. So that was cool to hear their testimonies and feel how much they really want to serve the Lord! It would be hard to leave your house and your grandkids. I give them tons of props! They also don't have to follow the white handbook so I think I'd enjoy their mission a lot!!!! You just get to be yourself and share the gospel. What more could you want?

 

Anywho after that meeting we gave a blessing to Sherry Daniel. She is a less active who just found she has cancer. So that's not good, but we had brother Homan come and give her that blessing and he was definitely the man for the job. I felt like he and her have been best friends for 20- 30 years and it was a really good blessing. You could just see her worries go away. :) She will be in my prayers along with our investigators and those who are having trials back home. Love you all!

Love Elder Christensen 

Elder Christensen: Letter 1/13/14 "Good stuff"

Well family, this week was pretty fun other than freezing to death in the beginning! I'm glad I had all my winter gear! We did visit one of our investigators; Dustin. He and Amanda had a few arguments over the holidays, and he got pretty wasted and yelled some pretty mean things, so he got arrested and released this week. We saw him and he was a mess!  He even remembered the last words I said to him before the holidays. I said "Have Fun, but not too much fun, stay away from the drinks." He said jokingly, "that won't be fun then," and we left. He said my words rang through his head in jail over and over again, and he wishes he would've listened.  He is at the lowest I've ever seen him though. But it's bringing on tons of good changes. He dumped every bottle of alcohol he had in front of us and said, "I'm never touching this stuff again." So hopefully he sticks to it! I'm sure Amanda will come back once he gets his life back on track, but if he wont let the gospel in, he's got a long way to go...

We had a killer lesson with Austin this week! We watched 2 short clips and the Spirit was super strong during the basketball one and since we just played basketball last week, I think it softened his heart. After the video I said, "Austin I know that you've felt the Spirit with us and God will answer your prayers." There was a long pause and no one talked for like forever it felt like, and then he said, "I don't know why, but baptism just keeps popping back into my head almost like the Spirit is shoving me into it." His dad said, "Austin that's the Holy Ghost telling you it's right." And with his dad being an excommunicated member, he began to cry because he felt the Spirit again and said, "son I know you're ready. I wish I was too."  Then Austin set his baptism date for his mother's birthday, on March 14th. I don't know if I'll be here then with my transfer history! I could be gone in 2 weeks! Ha! Ha! So we will see... If I'm here or not, I know we made a difference in his life and being able to invite the spirit into their home has made a world of difference ! All in all its been a good week. I love ya family !     

Love Elder Christensen 

Elder Christensen: Letter 01/7/14 "ICE Crystal City"

Well family, this week was the coldest week ever! Ha! Ha! Zero degrees was our high for 3 days and it snowed 12 inches. They shut down the whole city of St. Louis for 2 days.  We also had a wind chill of -35, so I'm glad I was well prepared for this. We went tracting for like 20 minutes, and the police told us to go home, that it was not safe for anyone to be outside. So 2 days of chilling in the apartment, got tons of studies in, but when I finally got Spiritually yoked. Ha! Ha! It was fun time lol.  Then we helped tons of people get their cars out of the snow, which was fun. I found the best way to do it is to shovel til you get to the road and have them spin their tires and just push the car over till the tires hit the road, then rock it hard ha ha good stuff!

We did get to teach an awesome lesson to Austin, and invited him to pray for a baptismal date and we watched "things that matter most," from  Elder Utchdorf  and that was just what his father needed to hear as well. It's way cool to see the Spirit working on both of them. Then afterwards we played some basketball to build our trust with Austin and he is a little ball for 14 years old. Burned my companion a few times lol! But all around that was a blast! We played some 21 and a few games of horse. We also had another lesson with Katrina Holmes. She used to live in Florissant ha ha! So I know her Aunt and they're so much alike it's crazy! They both can talk forever! Ha! Ha! That was the longest lesson of my life! 2 and a half hours! I was trying to get out for 2 hours of that. Ha! Ha! I heard the same story easy 3 times lol. But missions will teach you patience that's for sure!

Well, I'm officially starting on my (6 months to sexy) ha ha! I did my body cleanse and lost all my holiday weight. I lost 10 pounds and now its time to rebuild and cut up! Ha! Ha! I am going for a mean 150 lbs. I hope it all works out. Can't see my friends looking chub chub ha ha! I love you all and hope you are all safe in your travels!!

Love Elder Christensen